Ready to rock you, again!

THE Lyric Theatre’s production of the Ben Elton and Queen musical We Will Rock You is set to return to Her Majesty’s this Friday.

After closing in July due to COVID lockdowns, the jukebox musical will continue its theatrical run, and director Stephen Armati said the show looks to be better than ever.

“After seven months of wondering, we’ve finally got some clear air ahead of us. It’s going to be a great return to the stage,” he said.

The cast and crew were able to play one show on opening night before restrictions interrupted the rest of the run, and the director said the cast and crew have been kept engaged via zoom rehearsals and social catchups.

“Fortunately, all of our principal cast have come back,” he said.

“We lost four musicians in the process but we had a pretty healthy ensemble anyway, so it was just a matter of reshaping things to accommodate for the people that did leave.”

That extra production time has allowed the team to tweak parts of the show and experiment with new approaches to polish and “revamp” performances.

An extra five shows have been added to the run, and 100 tickets have been donated directly to frontline workers across two performances in early March.

Lyric Theatre president Michael Whitehead extended his thanks to Her Majesty’s as well as the fans for their continued support, with many keeping their tickets from the show’s original run.

“It could have been disastrous, but the community has come back on force,” he said. “It’s enabled us to roll on and roll on into another show and to add all these extra elements to it.”

After consulting with industry colleagues, Armati said the team has found a “happy medium” between providing a COVID safe environment without diminishing the quality of the show.

With 75 per cent of tickets sold and allocation exhausted for some shows, the pair said they are looking forward to finishing what they started.

“To be able to come back to what we love that’s been taken away from us all this time. It’s really special,” Armati said.

Visit hermaj.com/events/rock for more information